5 reasons to install home battery storage

August 31, 2017

Battery storage is making waves in the energy industry at the moment. It is being developed for everything from cars to national energy management. But it can also have benefits on a domestic level. Let us explain!

Home battery storage can save you money

If you generate your own renewable energy with solar PV or a wind turbine, installing a battery storage system can maximise the potential for savings on your energy bills. Most households with solar panels generate enough energy to subsidise their bills, as they provide some of their domestic electricity requirement themselves. You can take this one step further by combining home renewables with a battery storage system.

The only real downside of renewable energy generation is its intermittency. With battery storage brought into the equation, this is no longer necessarily a problem. It allows you to use everything you generate, charging batteries when the sun is shining and discharging the stored electricity later on when solar panels are no longer generating electricity. Without battery storage, any electricity that is not used as soon as it is generated is sent to the grid, and at the times when your solar panels are not producing energy, such as at night or on a really cloudy day, you pay to import electricity into your home, just like everyone else.

With Feed-in Tariff payments (government payments made to you for the electricity you export) as low they currently are, what you’ll be paid is less than what you’d save on your bills using the energy yourself. It’s worth keeping as much as possible of the electricity you generate, to minimise the amount you have to buy. This could save you considerable amounts of money.

To save even more, those on time of use tariffs could theoretically charge their batteries with electricity from the grid during the really cheap off-peak times and use the electricity whenever they like, meaning they never have to pay peak rates. You wouldn’t even need home renewables for this – although (for now at least) probably only those with home renewables would find it financially worthwhile to install battery storage.

Home battery storage can make you self-sufficient

As discussed in the point above, home battery storage reduces your reliance on imported energy. In theory, you could become entirely self sufficient, or at the very least reduce the amount of electricity you need to import from the National Grid. If the amount of electricity you need to import is reduced, it gives you more independence. If you have a big enough system, you could generate all your electricity yourself. If not, you will at least be less reliant on energy companies. One of the benefits of this is that you’ll be less influenced by energy price hikes. With the prices of fossil fuels volatile all over the world, and the big energy companies under-regulated and profit-driven, UK consumers are sadly often exploited by big business. If people make energy providers work harder for their custom, it could help bring prices down.

Home battery storage could help balance demand on a national level

The UK’s national energy infrastructure is under strain at the moment. Coal and nuclear power stations are being closed down, with nothing to replace them. If things don’t change soon, the UK could face blackouts. Battery storage on a domestic level could help soften demand, as people won’t be so reliant on all importing energy at the same times, for instance when everyone is cooking dinner at the same time! Households using their own stored energy could help the National Grid balance supply better if there aren’t the same level of surges at peak times.

Home battery storage can give you back up electricity

Some battery storage systems can discharge electricity to run appliances during a power cut. Luckily, power cuts are not that common in the UK, but with the current shortfall in energy generation, the National Grid is under more pressure than ever, and power cuts could happen more often. You could avoid the inconvenience altogether by ensuring you have power even in a power cut. However, not all systems give back-up power – check with your installer before you buy.

Home battery storage can mean a greener lifestyle

You can never know exactly where your electricity comes from unless you generate it yourself. Sadly, a huge amount of UK energy comes from non-renewable sources. If you’re not using this, you’ll lower your carbon footprint – and if it were to be adopted on a wider scale, the UK could vastly reduce its fossil fuel emissions.

Installing battery storage

Interested in having a battery storage system installed in your home? We have scoured the country for the best tradesmen, so that we can make sure we only recommend those we really trust.

If you would like us to find you a local installer to help install a battery storage system in your home, just fill in the form below and we will be in touch shortly!